For 'The Grace of Kings,' I read Han Dynasty historical records in Classical Chinese, which allowed me to get a sense of the complexity of the politics and the 'surprisingly modern' reactions of the historical figures to recurrent problems of state administration.
I do read books. I suppose it's more or less the same thing, but at least I'm alone and I'm an individual. I can stop anytime I want, which I frequently do.
In my final year of attending a Christian sports camp in rural Missouri, the year before I started high school, they began to offer an elective Bible study group for young Christians who wanted a chance to read in the afternoons instead of learn to water-ski.
I think the major good idea in Unix was its clean and simple interface: open, close, read, and write.
When you read a play, the words speak to you. When you read a script, there's no way you can tell if that's the way that movie will turn out.
I was always a good student, but I didn't read that much until I was 18 and I was working my way through college.
I used to practice cello while watching TV and films. I watched several complete TV series this way, including 'Lost' and 'The Wire.' As a kid, I'd read books while playing.
I get asked to read new works a lot, in the hope that I will give a quotation and I will only give a 'puff' for a book I truly love.
Every time I read a script, I see the movie in my head, and I try to see the best movie in my head because everybody interprets the movie differently.
I'm an early riser. I get up between five and six, have coffee, and read for a couple of hours before everyone else gets up.
If I buy a Fiat Uno, I'll read that, for a man like me, a Ferrari was more suitable. If instead I buy a Ferrari, they'll write that I should have kept my feet on the ground and bought a Fiat. If I smile, I'm not serious. If I don't smile, I'm a rich sulker that doesn't enjoy having the most beautiful job in the world.
You want an audience. If you didn't, you wouldn't be a writer. The biggest motivation to write is the knowledge that someone will read it.
One truth I've learned as a father: Children want presence more than presents. They don't want to read about you; they want you.
If you enjoy reading something, read it.
The planet is ill, everyone knows that. But I need to be optimistic, otherwise I would just be adding to the negativity. So every night I come on Madrid TV and read a piece of good news.
I remember reading the cruelest, most awful thing about my hair online. A person speculated about who I was as a person and even read into my personal life based solely off my hairstyle. He or she said I must be lazy because I have short hair. It was just devastating.
Issues to do with disability, mental health and not being neurotypical often affect many genuine teenagers but are rarely reflected in the fiction they read.
When people read 'Breitbart' every single day and convince themselves that Barack Obama is a foreign terrorist, that is not a problem of government. That is a problem of community failure, and we have to recognize that.
There's something magical about the idea that you can write something down and someone else can read it. I'm still mildly agog about that.
I write for the same reason I read: to find out what's going to happen.
I read the Steve Jobs book, and that kind of changed everything. I've been, like, an Apple geek my whole life and have always seen him as a hero. But reading the book, and learning about how he built the company, and maintaining that corporate culture and all that, I think that influenced me a lot.
There's no more to Holden Caulfield. Read the book again. It's all there. Holden Caulfield is only a frozen moment in time.
I have to confess that I don't read much of what is written about me.
An author is somebody who writes a story. It doesn't matter if you're a kid or if you're a grown-up, it doesn't matter if the book gets published and lots of people get to read it, or if you make just one copy and you share that book with one friend.
The first comic I ever read was an 'X-Men' themed anti-smoking PSA they gave out in health class when I was about 10.
I have said it often and I will say it again: I believe you learn to read when you are young, then read to learn for the rest of your life.
It's not like I wake up every morning and just can't wait to write. It is my job. It's much easier to not write. I'd rather read. This is my income. This is what supports my family. Having a child is a pretty big incentive to keep working.
Everything I write, I read aloud. It has to sound a certain way and look a certain way on page.
I think that as is true in this industry, everything gets blown out of proportion because it's more fun for people to read about. It's even more fun to read about if the stories get wilder and wilder.
I loved the stories my parents and grandparents would read to me.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez is one of my all-time favorite writers. I feel spiritual when reading his words, even though they're translated. I wish desperately that I could read it in its original language. I already feel like I'm going to church when I read him; imagine if I could read it in the original.
Normally, I just sit in my quiet little room and do the small things that bring me pleasures. I read my books, I answer email, I write a little bit.
I don't function well in certain aspects of society, and you can read into that what you will.
My attitude is that if anybody of any age wants to read a book, let them, but I do think that no child would want to read 'Boneland.'
It's funny, because people always say when they meet me, having read me - or they read me, having met me - that they are struck by how the tone is pretty similar, in real life and in the books.
I read a blog about this young filmmaker in the Philippines who made a short film, and one of the characters in the film reads my novel and then starts discussing the novel with someone. The idea that my book can inspire another artist and be part of that other artist's work... that's the reason I write.
